Google closes in on $1 billion invested in renewable energy

Rippey, Iowa is the latest beneficiary of the search giant's green efforts.

Google announced a $75 million equity investment in a 50 megawatt wind farm in Rippey, Iowa today. On its own, perhaps this announcement is dust in the wind to everyone outside Greene County. But this news is just the latest act in Google's continued renewable energy efforts—and it pushes the company's total renewable energy investments to more than $990 million.

Google's energy spending is outlined on the company's Google Green site. The nearly $1 billion covers projects across the globe: Germany, North Dakota, Oregon, California, and (of course) Iowa. The largest check—$280 million—supports a project called SolarCity, which aims to make residential solar projects more accessible. Google's funds will help SolarCity offer up to 8,000 additional customers the option to go through a solar lease or power agreement. That's more than a 50 percent increase for the company; SolarCity completed or is currently building out more than 15,000 residential solar systems. (In the Google agreement, SolarCity helps the customer design their system. Google purchases that up front and then receives a portion of the lease payments going forward.)

Today's Iowa investment goes toward the Rippey project, developed by RPM Access. It will use wind turbines to power more than 15,000 homes. This isn't Google's first green effort in Iowa—the company entered a long-term contract to purchase wind energy from NextEra Energy Resources’ Story County II wind farm in 2010. (Google's Iowa interest stems from a data center it operates in Council Bluffs, Iowa; a little more than two hours away from Rippey.)

24 Reader Comments

Nice to see that a bit of all this money coming from pestering me with targeted ads is put to useful work.

What's strange is that Apple seems to have no idea what to do with their $120b cash pile. I mean, they could put up a manned Mars mission and still keep half of it for whatever they think it will do them good. I really don't mean to troll, but I hate money lying around aimlessly. What would you do if you had 60 billion dollars to work with? What about a *real* fusion drive? This is an awesome lot of money if you put it to work. Doing nothing with it is such a waste.

What's strange is that Apple seems to have no idea what to do with their $120b cash pile. I mean, they could put up a manned Mars mission and still keep half of it for whatever they think it will do them good. I really don't mean to troll, but I hate money lying around aimlessly.

The money's not sitting around aimlessly. It's invested in reliable finance operations in countries all around the world. Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by it. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets.

It's not $120b cash, it's $120b "cash equivalent" which is finance speak for "we loan it out to other people, mostly banks, who we trust to give most of it back one day".

uhuznaa wrote:

What would you do if you had 60 billion dollars to work with? What about a *real* fusion drive? This is an awesome lot of money if you put it to work. Doing nothing with it is such a waste.

I'm not sure what I'd do, but I wouldn't throw much of it at a fusion drive that may or may not even be possible.

It's really good to see more projects like this going ahead. I wish our governments would spend more money on it, instead of just private investment.

It's an up-hill battle though. We have had a small pilot windfarm near my house (in australia) for almost 10 years now and it's been a massive success. However ongoing attempts to build a much larger duplicate that will actually produce a significant amount of power have been blocked.

Every site they pick gets nocked back by locals who are convinced it will kill all the birds or create inaudible constant sound that will destroy the hearing of everyone within a few hundred kilometres or create turbulence in the air that will upset the environment.

It's all total bullshit, but if the local government wants to stay elected they have no choice but to refuse any application to build a windfarm (often they even reject it months after giving excited approval to the project).

The money's not sitting around aimlessly. It's invested in reliable finance operations in countries all around the world. Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by it. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets.

Your phrasing made it sounded as if Apple was some superhero corporation that secretly went around, spreading money to those in need. The reality is more like this:Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by a load that included Apple's $$ where the local government effectively generate monetary returns for Apple, out of tax payers' pockets. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets, which means the interests you'll pay down the road will go back to Apple's pockets, and much more!

Regardless of the detail, uhuznaa's point still stands though. Apple investing 120B in "safe" financing is exactly the same as 120,000 firms investing 1M each to safe financing (holy shit that really is a big load of money!) when Apple could have done so much more by investing some money in risky but beneficially technologies that may make less financial sense.

Yes, Apple has a responsibility to its shareholders, but shouldn't Apple's responsibility to the world (not just USA as they make a huge sum of money internationally) be given priorities as well?

Since the topic turned out to Apple's contribution to the world, I doubt their pile of cash is making any difference. This company is great embarking on challenging projects and redefining user experience. Consider the areas which Apple didn't touch, for example did you ever set up home theater system? Let's focus on AV receivers: looking onto back panel of these, one can't avoid a feeling that those folks have no idea what they are doing. Remote control mess takes second place. Then, they keep adding channels in apparent contest with Gillette adding blades. How is it possible that humans have only two sound sensors, but the sound system has to have 11? On top of this there is matrix of surround sound formats which looks like invented by some severely brain damaged individual. Wan't to know Apple approach to this? Set up as many speakers as you want, place them at your convenience (although we have some recommendations*), connect them to terminals numbered 1,2,3,4... in any permutation order, we'll figure out the rest.

The money's not sitting around aimlessly. It's invested in reliable finance operations in countries all around the world. Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by it. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets.

Question. Does Apple have a philanthropy website similar to Google.org? If not, why isn't Apple more public about its generosity?

On a side note, it looks like Google is walking the walk. Regardless how one feels about Google, one gotta give kudos to Google for this. If only Google & Apple would ally with each other on this front and form some sort of business alliance to toggle this issue, it will certainly make that many more companies take notice. But probably will not happen in this multiverse...

The money's not sitting around aimlessly. It's invested in reliable finance operations in countries all around the world. Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by it. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets.

Question. Does Apple have a philanthropy website similar to Google.org? If not, why isn't Apple more public about its generosity?

I beleive they changed their internal policy so that if any member of staff donates to a charity, Apple will donate as much again, something like that.

Tempting to wonder what might have happened if Jobs had pulled a Gates and set his mind to other problems around the world than smart phones, but he just seemed to be quite committed to the manufacture of consumer goods and nothing else.

Yes, Apple has a responsibility to its shareholders, but shouldn't Apple's responsibility to the world (not just USA as they make a huge sum of money internationally) be given priorities as well?

The point is that you can do extraordinary things if you have extraordinary powers and having $120b while still making sound profits anyway *is* extraordinary powers. It's not even about responsibility, it's about potential and its use.

I think it's very interesting that solar energy gets to be labled "renewable". Can some bright Arsian please enlighten me as to exactly how we'll renew the sun once it's used up? Is there a plan to drag in another one when ours done, because that would be way cool.

I think it's very interesting that solar energy gets to be labled "renewable". Can some bright Arsian please enlighten me as to exactly how we'll renew the sun once it's used up? Is there a plan to drag in another one when ours done, because that would be way cool.

You seem to be confusing "renewable" with "infinitely renewable."

Capturing the solar energy and converting it to electricity has no real effect on the supply available.

Taking hydrocarbons out of the ground has a negative effect on the supply available.

I think it's very interesting that solar energy gets to be labled "renewable". Can some bright Arsian please enlighten me as to exactly how we'll renew the sun once it's used up? Is there a plan to drag in another one when ours done, because that would be way cool.

You seem to be confusing "renewable" with "infinitely renewable."

Capturing the solar energy and converting it to electricity has no real effect on the supply available.

Taking hydrocarbons out of the ground has a negative effect on the supply available.

No, not really confused about that, although "infinetely renewable" violates some pretty fundamental rules of physics.I also understand that using solar energy (probably) doesn't affect the total reserves.I just take issue with using the word renewable for something that isn't. It's an enormous resource, and by the time it's gone we won't be around to mourn it's loss, but we certainly can't make more of it.Yes, I'm being pedantic, but I hate to see another common word lose its meaning. Make it kinda hard fer us old folk to know how to talk good.

I think it's very interesting that solar energy gets to be labled "renewable". Can some bright Arsian please enlighten me as to exactly how we'll renew the sun once it's used up? Is there a plan to drag in another one when ours done, because that would be way cool.

You seem to be confusing "renewable" with "infinitely renewable."

Capturing the solar energy and converting it to electricity has no real effect on the supply available.

Taking hydrocarbons out of the ground has a negative effect on the supply available.

No, not really confused about that, although "infinetely renewable" violates some pretty fundamental rules of physics.I also understand that using solar energy (probably) doesn't affect the total reserves.I just take issue with using the word renewable for something that isn't. It's an enormous resource, and by the time it's gone we won't be around to mourn it's loss, but we certainly can't make more of it.Yes, I'm being pedantic, but I hate to see another common word lose its meaning. Make it kinda hard fer us old folk to know how to talk good.

If you look at "solar energy" as the total energy output of the sun, then you are correct. It is a finite resource that will eventually run out. The key thing is that "solar energy" from a practical human perspective does not refer to the total energy output of the sun, but only the part that we are able to capture in some way (photovoltaic, photosynthesis, etc), and very often is used as a shorthand for photovoltaic specifically. From this perspective, the total solar output is something completely out of our control (we can't turn off the sun to conserve its fuel), but our ability to capture and use a portion of that energy that reaches the Earth is renewable on an instantaneous basis.

Capturing more today doesn't mean there will be less to capture tomorrow. It won't cause the sun to burn out sooner. The act of capturing energy that is radiated from the sun (outside of our control) is not expending a stored energy reserve in the way that extracting and burning fossil fuels does.

Hopefully better investment than what US gov't tried to do to jump start green energy.

This is a virtually risk-free investment for Google. Wind projects are fairly mature technology and this one is not only already operating, but it's power is being sold under contract to an electric cooperative. In addition Google and the project's other owners are provided a 2.2 cent tax credit for every kWh the project produces over its first 10 years in production. In other words, they bought a revenue stream. It has almost nothing to do with the type of renewable energy investments that the government did that became controversial.

You are presumably referring to the loan guarantee program, which is aimed at "innovative" technologies and projects. (i.e. higher risk things). It will be interesting to see how this program winds up. Certainly many of these loans will yield a positive return for the government, particularly the power projects. The manufacturing projects and battery-related companies are probably more likely to have issues.

With regards to the Google deal, the more interesting thing is that it's one of the few "corporates" to invest in renewables. Since Google actually has a sizable tax burden, they can actually use those tax benefits. Most

+3/-16... I wonder what average ars reader is; somebody holding bachelor arts degree incapable comprehending simple numbers? Is it your nostalgia to "pristine" 15th century windmill landscape that blinds you to the cold number of 2%? Oh, its green, and therefore is good by it's own virtue, and therefore doesn't have to have any sense.

Let reiterate one more time: 2% is nothing to talk about. It's an infinitesimal lost in vast universe. Building those monsters is a waste of resources, 15th century technology scaled up is nothing to get excited about. Compare it to to mastering thermonuclear which elevates your abilities to what our beloved star is doing (subject of many mythologies).

I think it's very interesting that solar energy gets to be labled "renewable". Can some bright Arsian please enlighten me as to exactly how we'll renew the sun once it's used up? Is there a plan to drag in another one when ours done, because that would be way cool.

You fool, we'll use the moonbeams of course. That moon gets pretty bright at night.

+3/-16... I wonder what average ars reader is; somebody holding bachelor arts degree incapable comprehending simple numbers? Is it your nostalgia to "pristine" 15th century windmill landscape that blinds you to the cold number of 2%? Oh, its green, and therefore is good by it's own virtue, and therefore doesn't have to have any sense.

Let reiterate one more time: 2% is nothing to talk about. It's an infinitesimal lost in vast universe. Building those monsters is a waste of resources, 15th century technology scaled up is nothing to get excited about. Compare it to to mastering thermonuclear which elevates your abilities to what our beloved star is doing (subject of many mythologies).

I agree 2% is nothing, say... can I get 2% of your income? Also, how long and how much money have we poured into finding oil? And how long and how much money have we spent on wind farms? Hey, also the institute of petroleum engineers say we got 50 years left of oil. How long is wind going to last? Someone better ask a meteorologist.

Well I have degrees in physics and mathematics and I voted down. You failed to mention the full quote which was actually "2% and that will double over the next couple years".

238 GW word wide. At peak power/wind times equivalent to approximately 100 2GW nuclear power plants and growing exponentially. And the people who made the decision to go with wind are probably often owners/investors/administrators in/of nuclear power plants (utility companies, etc).

To get more up votes perhaps you could mention your qualifications and experience and why it gives you more insight relevant to designating this type of project as a "Boondoggle" than the thousands of people who have invested in and built 238GW world wide. Thank you.

You failed to mention the full quote which was actually "2% and that will double over the next couple years".

I omitted "...it would never be complete solution" as well.

Quote:

At peak power/wind times equivalent to approximately 100 2GW nuclear power plants and growing exponentially. And the people who made the decision to go with wind are probably often owners/investors/administrators in/of nuclear power plants (utility companies, etc).

You must be well aware that nuclear always work close to its peak, while the average wind capacity is what, 10%? Therefore, wouldn't exhibiting peak wind capacity and comparing it to always-on nuclear little disingenuous? At the end of the day it is nuclear (and dirty fossil fuels) that saves that sorry green energy ass.

It is widely accepted and often stated (often reflected in the the renewable goals of entire nations) that intermittent power sources can make up at most 20% of the grid in its current form. The speaker was only stating the obvious there. And you are re-stating it here.

Quote:

You must be well aware that nuclear always work close to its peak, while the average wind capacity is what, 10%?

According to Wikipedia: "The capacity factor achieved by new wind turbines in 2004 and 2005 reached 36%."

So 248GB wind peak (the 2011 number) gives us an amount of *energy* approximately equivalent to that produced by an 89 GW always-on plant, or 45 2GW nuclear power plants. So we have 45 2-GW nuclear power plant equivalents in wind, increasing at 25% per year (doubling in a little over every three years).

The money's not sitting around aimlessly. It's invested in reliable finance operations in countries all around the world. Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by it. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets.

Your phrasing made it sounded as if Apple was some superhero corporation that secretly went around, spreading money to those in need. The reality is more like this:Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by a load that included Apple's $$ where the local government effectively generate monetary returns for Apple, out of tax payers' pockets. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets, which means the interests you'll pay down the road will go back to Apple's pockets, and much more!

Regardless of the detail, uhuznaa's point still stands though. Apple investing 120B in "safe" financing is exactly the same as 120,000 firms investing 1M each to safe financing (holy shit that really is a big load of money!) when Apple could have done so much more by investing some money in risky but beneficially technologies that may make less financial sense.

Yes, Apple has a responsibility to its shareholders, but shouldn't Apple's responsibility to the world (not just USA as they make a huge sum of money internationally) be given priorities as well?

It just proves that Apple is shortsighted in it's long-term goals. They play up the 'hype cycle' to their advantage and claim to make 'revolutionary innovations' but how much of their work is based on original R&D. I would say none. The only thing they specialize in is integrating existing technologies in a way that makes the accessible to the public (at a premium). The only 'revolutionary' work they have done is in claiming ownership of existing technologies via patents and creating new barriers of entry for newcomers.

They have accrued enough reserves that they could fail for decades without having to worry about going under but all it will take to break their advantage over their competitors is one landmark judgement to overturn the abuse of patents in software.

Google is an interesting example of a company that is doing ground-breaking work with long-term gains in mind (both social and financial) but they aren't the first. Just take a look at IBM for a company that cemented their gains in the short term through good business practices then looked toward longer-term and higher risk investments to stay relevant in the long term. Ever used a RISC processor, DRAM, a Hard Disk, IBM had a huge hand in the creation and implementation of all of those technologies and they continue to innovate today.

What's especially interesting is, while Microsoft took to massive growth in spite of IBMs investment in their platform, Microsoft is now facing a downturn because of their ability to innovate outside of their specialty. OTOH, IBM is still as strong as ever and continuing to make a steady march toward progress. In fact, they've made so much progress that it's hard to define where there focus lies because they're integrated in to systems across the board.

It begs the question. Microsoft had the money all along and Bill Gates is no stranger to investing in social progress so, why did he have to leave Microsoft to pursue his goals. What qualities about the culture of Microsoft prevented him from taking a similar path to the founders of Google?

Tech companies have always been a shaky investment simply because there wasn't enough historical data to determine what makes a tech company successful in the long term. I get the feeling that trend may change now that we have two generations of tech companies with contrasting strategies that can be compared.

Lets say in 10-15 years that search engines are rendered obsolete by the semantic web being realized. Desktop operating systems are no longer in use outside of the enterprise because a phone can be docked to either a TV (for media) or a monitor/keyboard (for use as a traditional desktop). Which would you rather invest in today, the company that is becoming increasingly worse at maintaining the quality of their desktop platform today, or the company that has the potential to continue profiting because they own a significant market share of the power infrastructure as well as hundreds of other innovations that have been incorporated into the public/private/government infrastructures.

If it were my money, I sure as hell wouldn't bet on the 'one trick pony'. They may be rich today but industry isn't kind to those who fail to innovate beyond their one specialty (ie integration).

The money's not sitting around aimlessly. It's invested in reliable finance operations in countries all around the world. Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by it. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets.

Your phrasing made it sounded as if Apple was some superhero corporation that secretly went around, spreading money to those in need. The reality is more like this:Perhaps the road you drive to work on was funded by a load that included Apple's $$ where the local government effectively generate monetary returns for Apple, out of tax payers' pockets. Or maybe the loan you bought your car with came out of Apple's pockets, which means the interests you'll pay down the road will go back to Apple's pockets, and much more!

Regardless of the detail, uhuznaa's point still stands though. Apple investing 120B in "safe" financing is exactly the same as 120,000 firms investing 1M each to safe financing (holy shit that really is a big load of money!) when Apple could have done so much more by investing some money in risky but beneficially technologies that may make less financial sense.

Yes, Apple has a responsibility to its shareholders, but shouldn't Apple's responsibility to the world (not just USA as they make a huge sum of money internationally) be given priorities as well?

It just proves that Apple is shortsighted in it's long-term goals. They play up the 'hype cycle' to their advantage and claim to make 'revolutionary innovations' but how much of their work is based on original R&D. I would say none. The only thing they specialize in is integrating existing technologies in a way that makes the accessible to the public (at a premium). The only 'revolutionary' work they have done is in claiming ownership of existing technologies via patents and creating new barriers of entry for newcomers.

They have accrued enough reserves that they could fail for decades without having to worry about going under but all it will take to break their advantage over their competitors is one landmark judgement to overturn the abuse of patents in software.

Google is an interesting example of a company that is doing ground-breaking work with long-term gains in mind (both social and financial) but they aren't the first. Just take a look at IBM for a company that cemented their gains in the short term through good business practices then looked toward longer-term and higher risk investments to stay relevant in the long term. Ever used a RISC processor, DRAM, a Hard Disk, IBM had a huge hand in the creation and implementation of all of those technologies and they continue to innovate today.

What's especially interesting is, while Microsoft took to massive growth in spite of IBMs investment in their platform, Microsoft is now facing a downturn because of their ability to innovate outside of their specialty. OTOH, IBM is still as strong as ever and continuing to make a steady march toward progress. In fact, they've made so much progress that it's hard to define where there focus lies because they're integrated in to systems across the board.

It begs the question. Microsoft had the money all along and Bill Gates is no stranger to investing in social progress so, why did he have to leave Microsoft to pursue his goals. What qualities about the culture of Microsoft prevented him from taking a similar path to the founders of Google?

Tech companies have always been a shaky investment simply because there wasn't enough historical data to determine what makes a tech company successful in the long term. I get the feeling that trend may change now that we have two generations of tech companies with contrasting strategies that can be compared.

Lets say in 10-15 years that search engines are rendered obsolete by the semantic web being realized. Desktop operating systems are no longer in use outside of the enterprise because a phone can be docked to either a TV (for media) or a monitor/keyboard (for use as a traditional desktop). Which would you rather invest in today, the company that is becoming increasingly worse at maintaining the quality of their desktop platform today, or the company that has the potential to continue profiting because they own a significant market share of the power infrastructure as well as hundreds of other innovations that have been incorporated into the public/private/government infrastructures.

If it were my money, I sure as hell wouldn't bet on the 'one trick pony'. They may be rich today but industry isn't kind to those who fail to innovate beyond their one specialty (ie integration).

The ability to combine existing technologies or inventions into a single, clean, usable interface is not something that should be overlooked. It may be true that Apple have adopted many of the technologies that they use from others, but the ability to PRESENT them is invaluable. In the gaming industry I've often seen Blizzard in the same light. They very rarely come up with anything truly original; instead, they take the best elements from various disciplines and genres, polish repeatedly and sell it in a cohesive package (D3 aside).

If Apple can continue to apply that skill effectively it sounds like a winning formula for many years to come, although - personally - it seems like the loss of Steve Jobs has reduced their abilities in that department quite dramatically.